CHAPTER 12: Starting with Something Basic

John's POV

Master Shifu, after giving me a tour of my "new home", leads me over to the training hall of the palace.

As he opened the doors, my eyes widened. I couldn't believe the size of this room.

'Oh my fucking god!' I mentally screamed.

The five were going through the complex course set up. Crane worked on his balance on this green turtle shaped bowl, Viper dodging burst of pyro, Mantis blazing through the training dummies with break neck speed, Monkey using his acrobatic skills going through spiked hoops, and Tigress hopping and dodging her way through the gauntlet.

She then hits one of the spiked wooden targets with a dual palm strike, which causes it to explode into several chunks. One of the larger pieces was heading towards my face.

Quickly thinking, I blocked it with my forearm, followed by bouncing it off my knee before giving it a rather aggressive spinning back kick, which sent the piece flying through the wall before smashing something. Judging by the loud "TSHH", that "something" was probably made of glass.

"Umm, whatever that was...you might wanna get that fixed." I cringed

"Hopefully it can be restored. But that can wait, follow me." Shifu instructed me.

As we were walking alongside the course, he snapped his fingers, which got the five to stop what they were doing and to come towards us.

"Now, with what you have told me, and by the little move you just pulled, I can tell you have a lot of confidence. However, since most of us here have never fully seen you back your words up, and with not seeing you do kung fu, it leaves me no choice then to start with something more…simple." Shifu said.

He then led me to this panda looking punching bag. Thinking that he was tricking me, I started looking around to see if there was a hidden switch to activate some robotic swinging arms to surprise me with.

"Can I ask you what you are doing?" Shifu asks

I turn back to see not only him, but the five standing in front of me as well. I started feeling both very bad and rather awkward.

"Umm, well I was checking to see if this had any hidden secrets for me, you know like a challenge? Hehe." I nervously responded.

Not gonna lie, but I was genuinely freaked out, considering the events that took place a couple hours ago.

"Look, as much as I would like to make you dive head first into a training exercise, you need to start with something more basic."

"Are you for real? This thing's for kids. Why in the-"

"I am aware of that Captain, but like I said, none of us here have seen what your abilities are. Except for Viper of course."

My ears drooped. My first training exercise was hitting a child's toy.

"Fine. What do you want me to do?"

"Hit it."

'Should have guessed that.'

"Um…ok, and how do you want me to hit it?"

"Just hit it anyway you want." He said impatiently.

"Well alrighty then, lemme just loosen my arms up real quickly."

As I'm shaking my nerves off, I then had an idea pop into my head.

"Say just outta curiosity. When one of you strikes someone, do you use your fist or your palm?"

"Well only Tigress can really do something like that, considering she and Monkey are the only ones that have hands." Crane said.

"I typically use more my fists and Tigress uses a mix of both from what I've seen." Monkey added.

"Ok, well this is a lesson my kung fu teacher taught me back when I was younger. He taught me to rather than using the fists, you use your palms. That way you have 2 advantages during a fight."

"Now what would they be cowboy?" Mantis replied.

"MANTIS! Unnecessary." Viper slapped him for the second time.

"What, he did say he was-"

"No I think you mean Captain, but cowboy is close enough. Hell redneck works too." I chuckled

"Anywho, those 2 advantages are; more surface area with the palms adds additional strike force, and the risk of hurting your wrist drastically reduces by a fair amount."

"Care to demonstrate?" Shifu asked

"Sure thing Master." I readied up.

I first decided to show the traditional punch, which sent the dummy into the wall. I then set it back up before hitting it with a palm strike. The dummy then actually hit the wall and bounced back towards me.

"And there we have that." I said.

"Not bad, now show us a kick or two." Shifu replied.

"Roger dodger. I'll do 2 of my favorite styles of kicks. The traditional superkick followed by the spinning back kick, which you may have seen earlier."

I proceeded to demonstrate both kicks and to my surprise, I got some applause from some of the five.

"Nice job John." Viper said.

"Thank you, not bad for someone who was put on the spot eh?" I replied.

"Care to show us what you did to the pig? That looked rather painful yet very satisfying." Monkey requested.

"You mean the spear? Sure. I will need a helper for this, since the dummy is a little too large for me to wrap my arms around."

"I'll do it." I looked to see Tigress offering to help me out.

"Oh...ok then. I'm gonna need to set myself up though. If you could just stand over there so I can get a proper run up?"

We then proceed to move into position.

"I will warn you, this is not gonna feel nice." I gave a little warning.

"I can take the pain." She said.

"Ok then."

As I prepared myself, I caught her tail starting to twitch side to side. This made me realize that she was gonna move out of the way last minute.

'Hmm, time for plan B. Maybe if I bounce off the wall correctly, I can give an aerial attack to the dummy instead.'

I then got on all fours once again and began my run up. As I got within pouncing distance, I lowered my head to anticipate the jump. Sure enough, I then saw her feet leave the ground and move over to the right. So I kept my head down and gunned it for the wall. I then jumped and twisted my body so that I could bounce off the wall with my legs.

I then propel myself upwards towards the railing above. I grabbed it and spun myself around before making my descent towards the dummy. I then land a crossbody on the dummy. I hit it with such force that we both broke through the floor and crashed in the lower storage unit below.

"WOAH!" Monkey and Mantis yell.

"John, you alright down there?" Viper asked me.

"I'm ok." I said as I popped my head out of the hole.

"How did you know she was gonna do that?" Crane asked me.

"Well, I always expect the unexpected. That and I could see her tail twitch."

Tigress huffed in annoyance. I simply smirked. Not everyday some gets to outsmart Tigress like that.

"I have to say, not a bad start. Now, how about a little challenge?" Shifu came to me.

"Always down for a challenge Master."

"Excellent. How about you start on the balancing bowl and we throw targets for you to dodge and hit whilst maintaining your balance?"

"Wait, I get to run the course?!" I was rather shocked.

"You did say you were wanting a challenge. Right?"

"Point taken, well let's get this party started shall we?"

Cue Caught In A Mosh Anthrax (montage style scene)

As I got onto the bowl, she immediately started to shake from side to side. I actually almost fell face first in the bowl.

'Too fucking close. This should be interesting.'

"You ready Captain?" Shifu asked.

I gave him a thumbs up. He then snaps his fingers as the first targets fly towards me. I start by casually dodging them with ease. Then they started to come quicker which made things pretty crazy.

"Holy shit, this is insane!" I huffed.

After about a couple minutes, I finally lost my balance and fell into the bowl. That signaled the end of this round.

"Hooh, that was something else."

"You tired in there? Cause we are just getting started." Shifu said.

I brought myself back up and out of the bowl before getting my asd back into position for the next challenge.

Timeskip

After going through the training dummies and the gauntlet, I was now about to tackle the one I was rather not looking forward to doing; The Pyro Tubes.

"Viper how in the blue hell do I know when to dodge the flames?!"

"You'll feel the heat build up in the tube, that way you can dodge it before you turn into a wolf burger." She said. The others let out a little laugh.

"Ha. Ha. Ha. So funny, my ribs hurt." I sarcastically replied

"Focus Captain, this next section of the course requires full concentration. Can you do that?" Shifu said

"Yes Master."

Then the first set of flames began to shoot. I was able to dodge without any difficulty. Knowing that things were about to heat up rather quickly, I put on my game face and went into my YOLO zone.

Flames started to shoot out left and right. I quickly began jumping around like popcorn making sure I didn't burn my tail.

'Fuck this is hot!'

After a few minutes it finally stopped, for a brief moment. That was until I started feeling heat everywhere I went.

"Umm, why is it still heating up?"

"Master, shouldn't it stop fueling up?" Viper asked

"Ow, fucking hell. Guys this is really burning now!"

"It's performing an emergency shutdown. Which means all of the remaining gases are about to ignite." Shifu said.

"JOHN GET OUT OF THERE NOW!"

Upon hearing that, I got back on all fours and gunned it. Thinking that I was about to become a walking corndog, I dashed as fast as I could towards the ledge.

As I reached the edge, I went for the jump. Within 5 seconds of Viper screaming at me, I got my ass outta there before I got fried. I then turned back to see if anything had happened. Big mistake on my end.

"Huh, maybe it was a-"

*WOOF* This huge surge of fire just engulfs my face. I shield my face trying to not burn myself.

5 seconds later and it finally subsided. Not gonna lie, that sucked.

"John!" Viper slithered towards me.

"Are you ok?!"

"Yeah…I'm fine. Although I have to ask, am I missing an eyebrow?" I laughed.

"No but you did lose some hair of yours." She replied.

"That's all for today Captain. I have to say, not a bad start at all. You are all excused for today." Shifu said.

"Yes Master!" We all replied.

As we left the hall, Viper slithered beside me.

"So, be honest with me. How did I do?" I asked.

"You did really well. Now come on, let's get you some water and ice. You need it." She replied.

"No shit." I said.